EHR Interoperability

Improve Care Coordination by Sharing Information Quickly Between Systems and People Throughout the Hospital

Spok continually evaluates new ways to expand the value of the Spok Care Connect® communication platform across the healthcare IT ecosystem to help your organization meet your goals in light of investments made in electronic health record (EHR) systems. Spok offers a variety of integration and interoperability options to share data and functionality with hospital systems key to clinical workflows. We also leverage industry standards such as HL7 and participate in industry initiatives such as Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE).

With the wealth of information EHRs provide, it becomes more important to ensure that the critical alerts and messages staff need to execute on quickly are delivered and followed up on while filtering out or prioritizing less important information. Adding detailed clinical information to an event with data from the EHR drives faster, more efficient decision-making for providers.

Increase EHR Interoperability for Better Patient Care

The key is enabling staff with better mobile alerting and communication technology that integrates with the EHR system and helps staff address time-sensitive patient needs as soon as possible.

Explore the many inputs and outputs that Spok can connect to as you advance EHR interoperability at your organization:

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Maximize the Return on Your EHR System Investment

Hospitals and health systems have spent upwards of $1 billion in electronic health record (EHR) systems. We’ve entered the era of EHR optimization: Now that your EHR is fully implemented, how can you maximize your investment?

EHRs contain a wealth of information. However, they were designed to be systems of record rather than systems of communication. Spok can use the information in electronic patient records to make alerts and messages more actionable. Adding detailed clinical information to a patient event with data from the EHR, noting a patient’s medication allergies for example, helps drive faster, more efficient decision-making for providers.

The Spok Care Connect clinical communication platform integrates with all major EHR vendors, including Epic®, Cerner®, and MEDITECH®.

How Interoperability Improves Patient Care

By complementing your EHR and other primary clinical or IT systems with Spok Care Connect, you can solve key communication challenges—speeding response, connecting caregivers, and improving patient care. Spok Care Connect includes the full enterprise directory, including clinical and nonclinical care team members, to include those who access the EHR and those who do not.

Spok Care Connect also maintains up-to-date role assignments and on-call schedules, escalations to speed response, support for a variety of mobile devices, and individual provider preferences and full audit trails for traceability. This vital information is key to driving clinical workflows, yet it isn’t found in the EHR.

Spok Care Connect is a single communication platform complementing your investment in the EHR and removing silos of information that may be maintained by individual systems or departments. This single source of truth empowers everyone in the organization to collaborate, and delivers information to the right person so they can act on it.

Eliminate islands of information and evolve to an enterprise platform that supports smarter notifications and better care coordination throughout your facilities. When you have the technology to support a culture of communication, you’re also supporting a culture of patient safety: Many studies have shown that improved collaboration among care teams improves outcomes, patient satisfaction, and staff satisfaction.

Let’s take a look at the value of a unified healthcare communication platform in action.

Solving The Interoperability Challenge

Our Ongoing Commitment to Interoperability

We’re proud to be a member organization of Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) since 2009. This healthcare consortium of over 100 vendors develops and promotes simple-to-implement interoperability standards in the healthcare IT industry. Spok is an active member of the IHE technical and planning committees that are shaping the future of hospital system integration. Spok also participates annually in IHE Connectathon testing events with a focus on patient care device alert processing and work. Our solutions are tested against a wide variety of enterprise healthcare companies for alert management including EHR, patient monitoring, infusion, ventilator and OR workflow.

At HIMSS, we join a select group of vendors to participate in the Interoperability Showcase. Here, we simulate real patient care scenarios with our trusted technology partners and demonstrate how care is improved using our technologies and standard-based interoperability.